Sindhu now joins former India cricket team captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni as the second sportsperson to be nominated for the country’s third highest civilian honour this year.

The 22-year-old Hyderabadi shuttler was conferred the Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna Award — the highest sporting honour in India — in 2016 and the Padma Shri in 2015.

Sindhu, who was also a silver medallist at the World Badminton Championships in Glasgow last month, recently beat Japan’s Nozomi Okuhara to become the first Indian shuttler to clinch the Korea Open Superseries title.

Last week, she had jumped two places to the second spot in the Badminton World Federation (BWF) women’s singles rankings.

Meanwhile, according to sources the ministry also recommended India’s first individual Olympics medallist wrestler K.D. Jadhav’s name for the prestigious Padma Shri, 33 years after his death.

Jadhav had won India’s first individual Olympics medal by clinching a bronze at the 1952 Helsinki Games.